1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates generally to a laser-plasma extreme ultraviolet (EUV) radiation source and, more particularly, to a laser-plasma EUV radiation source that provides a stable solid target filament by employing an evaporation chamber to increase the vapor pressure around the liquid target material as it exits the nozzle.
2. Discussion of the Related Art
Microelectronic integrated circuits are typically patterned on a substrate by a photolithography process, well known to those skilled in the art, where the circuit elements are defined by a light beam propagating through a mask. As the state of the art of the photolithography process and integrated circuit architecture becomes more developed, the circuit elements become smaller and more closely spaced together. As the circuit elements become smaller, it is necessary to employ photolithography light sources that generate light beams having shorter wavelengths and higher frequencies. In other words, the resolution of the photolithography process increases as the wavelength of the light source decreases to allow smaller integrated circuit elements to be defined. The current trend for photolithography light sources is to develop a system that generates light in the extreme ultraviolet (EUV) or soft X-ray wavelengths (13-14 nm).
Various devices are the known in the art to generate EUV radiation. One of the most popular EUV radiation sources is a laser-plasma, gas condensation source that uses a gas, typically Xenon, as a laser plasma target material. Other gases, such as Argon and Krypton, and combinations of gases, are also known for the laser target material. In the known EUV radiation sources based on laser produced plasmas (LPP), the gas is typically cryogenically cooled in a nozzle to a liquid state, and then forced through an orifice or other nozzle opening into a vacuum process chamber as a continuous liquid stream or filament. Cryogenically cooled target materials, which are gases at room temperature, are required because they do not condense on the EUV optics, and because they produce minimal by-products that have to be evacuated by the process chamber. In some designs, the nozzle is agitated so that the target material is emitted from the nozzle as a stream of liquid droplets having a certain diameter (30-100 μm) and a predetermined droplet spacing.
The target stream is illuminated by a high-power laser beam, typically from an Nd:YAG laser, that heats the target material to produce a high temperature plasma which emits the EUV radiation. The laser beam is delivered to a target area as laser pulses having a desirable frequency. The laser beam must have a certain intensity at the target area in order to provide enough heat to generate the plasma.
FIG. 1 is a plan view of an EUV radiation source 10 of the type discussed above including a nozzle 12 having a target material storage chamber 14 that stores a suitable target material, such as Xenon, under pressure. A heat exchanger or condenser is provided in the chamber that cryogenically cools the target material to a liquid state. The liquid target material is forced through a narrowed throat portion or capillary tube 16 of the nozzle 12 to be emitted as a filament or stream 18 into a vacuum process chamber 26 towards a target area 20. The liquid target material will quickly freeze in the vacuum environment to form a solid filament of the target material as it propagates towards the target area 20. The vacuum environment in combination with the vapor pressure of the target material will cause the frozen target material to eventually break up into frozen target fragments, depending on the distance that the stream 18 travels and other factors.
A laser beam 22 from a laser source 24 is directed towards the target area 20 in the process chamber 26 to vaporize the target material filament. The heat from the laser beam 22 causes the target material to generate a plasma 30 that radiates EUV radiation 32. The EUV radiation 32 is collected by collector optics 34 and is directed to the circuit (not shown) being patterned, or other system using the EUV radiation. The collector optics 34 can have any shape suitable for the purposes of collecting and directing the radiation 32, such as a parabolic shape. In this design, the laser beam 22 propagates through an opening 36 in the collector optics 34, as shown. Other designs can employ other configurations.
In an alternate design, the throat portion 16 can be vibrated by a suitable device, such as a piezoelectric vibrator, to cause the liquid target material being emitted therefrom to form a stream of droplets. The frequency of the agitation determines the size and spacing of the droplets. If the target stream 18 is a series of droplets, the laser beam 22 is pulsed to impinge every droplet, or every certain number of droplets.
It is desirable that an EUV source has a good conversion efficiency. Conversion efficiency is a measure of the laser beam energy that is converted into recoverable EUV radiation. In order to achieve a good conversion efficiency, the target stream vapor pressure must be minimized because gaseous target material tends to absorb the generated EUV radiation. Further, liquid cryogen delivery systems operating near the gas-liquid phase saturation line of the target fluid's phase diagram are typically unable to project a stream of target material significant distances before instabilities in the stream cause it to break up or cause droplets to be formed. Moreover, the distance between the nozzle and the target area must be maximized to keep nozzle heating and condensable source debris to a minimum.
The process chamber is maintained at a pressure of a few militorr, or less, to minimize EUV absorption losses to vapor of the target material. As discussed above, the low temperature of the liquid target material and the low vapor pressure within the process chamber cause the target material to quickly freeze, usually as it exits the nozzle exit orifice. This quick freezing tends to create an ice build-up on the outer surface of the exit orifice of the nozzle. The ice build-up interacts with the stream, causing stream instabilities, which affects the ability of the target filament to reach the target area intact and with high positional precision. Also, filament spatial instabilities may occur as a result of freezing of the target material before radial variations in fluid velocity within the filament have relaxed, thereby causing stress-induced cracking of the frozen target filament. In other words, when the liquid target material is emitted as a liquid stream from the exit orifice, the speed of the fluid at the center of the stream is greater than the speed of the fluid at the outside of the stream. These speed variations will tend to equalize as the stream propagates. However, because the stream immediately freezes in the vacuum environment, stresses are induced within the frozen filament as a result of the velocity gradient. A further potential mechanism for spatial instabilities is cavitation of the fluid within the nozzle arising from a low pressure (less than the saturation vapor pressure) near the nozzle exit.